mene: "The Willowmere Chronicles" series includes daemons, but focusing more on the Ancient Greek version.
"His Dark Materials" series has a parallel world where everyone has a daemon, but in a different way than the daemons in the Willowmere Chronicles.

I really enjoyed this series - though I preferred the first one just a bit more. I found the characters interesting, and the whole idea fascinating... his version of the multi-verse is rather neat. I have my complaints about the books (I always do), but overall, these are keepers in my library. ( )

Throughout the entirety of this book, there is never any doubt that Lyra Belacqua will ever do anything other than what she wants. Together with her dæmon, Pantalaimon, and her kitchen boy friend, Roger, she explores all the nooks and crevices of Jordan College, where she has grown up a ward of the faculty and staff, demonstrating a headstrong confidence and a knack for rallying people to her causes (even if that’s picking turf wars with Gyptian children). More than anything else, Lyra has a knack for getting herself into trouble, even though Pan is always in her ear cautioning her to behave or avoid situations. Despite her young age, Lyra becomes more and more aware of the tense political climate that surrounds Jordan College and connects that to a growing tension displayed by the rest of the adults in her life. One day her friend Roger goes missing, and soon after she meets her mysterious and charming svelte mom, Mrs. Coulter, who invites her to go on a Polar Adventure. Despite the pampering she received, Lyra soon learns that her mom intends to use her as a political piece and runs away, gets ambushed by Catchers who are responsible for the mysterious disappearances of children, and rescued by Gyptians. Thus starts a journey in which the pieces try to figure out the motives of the major players, taking them far to the North to mysterious lands. Throughout it all, Lyra’s impetus remains finding and rescuing Roger, but she is caught in the middle of more than she realizes. The plot throughout is fast-paced and wrought with a subtle, radiating tension that gives weight to the narrative, despite being based upon the experiences of a child. The narrative is replete with characters who bring the action to life and lend it their humanity, and at no point is there any other option than to root for Lyra. Recommended for purchase. Ages 12 and up. ( )

As always, Pullman is a master at combining impeccable characterizations and seamless plotting, maintaining a crackling pace to create scene upon scene of almost unbearable tension. This glittering gem will leave readers of all ages eagerly awaiting the next installment of Lyra's adventures.

Into this wild abyss,The womb of nature and perhaps her grave,Of neither sea, not shore, nor air, nor fire,But all these in their pregnant causes mixedConfusedly, and which thus must ever fight,Unless the almighty maker them ordain,His dark materials to create more worlds,Into this wild abyss the wary fiendStood on the brink of hell and looked a while,Pondering his voyage...-- John Milton, Paradise Lost, Book II

Dedication

First words

Lyra and her dæmon moved through the darkening hall, taking care to keep to one side, out of sight of the kitchen.

Quotations

We are all subject to the fates. But we must all act as if we are not...or die of despair.

Last words

So Lyra and her daemon turned away from the world they were born in and looked toward the sun, and walked into the sky.

Wikipedia in English (5)

In a universe somewhat like our own, children are beginning to disappear from cities around England. For Lyra Belacqua, a half-wild orphan girl living at Jordan College, Oxford, the kidnappings are just another excuse for games, battles and tall stories - until her best friend Roger is reported missing. Vowing to rescue him, Lyra embarks upon a journey to the savage North, where physicists and theologians alike are conducting controversial research into the nature of something known only as 'Dust'. Apart from her friends the gyptians, her only guide is a curious golden instrument called an alethiometer. If she is to survive her ordeal, she will have to learn to interpret its cryptic and peculiar messages. 432

Some books improve with age--the age of the reader, that is. Such is certainly the case with Philip Pullman's heroic, at times heart-wrenching novel, The Golden Compass, a story ostensibly for children but one perhaps even better appreciated by adults. The protagonist of this complex fantasy is young Lyra Belacqua, a precocious orphan growing up within the precincts of Oxford University. But it quickly becomes clear that Lyra's Oxford is not precisely like our own--nor is her world. For one thing, people there each have a personal daemon, the manifestation of their soul in animal form. For another, hers is a universe in which science, theology, and magic are closely allied:

As for what experimental theology was, Lyra had no more idea than the urchins. She had formed the notion that it was concerned with magic, with the movements of the stars and planets, with tiny particles of matter, but that was guesswork, really. Probably the stars had daemons just as humans did, and experimental theology involved talking to them.

Not that Lyra spends much time worrying about it; what she likes best is "clambering over the College roofs with Roger the kitchen boy who was her particular friend, to spit plum stones on the heads of passing Scholars or to hoot like owls outside a window where a tutorial was going on, or racing through the narrow streets, or stealing apples from the market, or waging war." But Lyra's carefree existence changes forever when she and her daemon, Pantalaimon, first prevent an assassination attempt against her uncle, the powerful Lord Asriel, and then overhear a secret discussion about a mysterious entity known as Dust. Soon she and Pan are swept up in a dangerous game involving disappearing children, a beautiful woman with a golden monkey daemon, a trip to the far north, and a set of allies ranging from "gyptians" to witches to an armor-clad polar bear.

In The Golden Compass, Philip Pullman has written a masterpiece that transcends genre. It is a children's book that will appeal to adults, a fantasy novel that will charm even the most hardened realist. Best of all, the author doesn't speak down to his audience, nor does he pull his punches; there is genuine terror in this book, and heartbreak, betrayal, and loss. There is also love, loyalty, and an abiding morality that infuses the story but never overwhelms it. This is one of those rare novels that one wishes would never end. Fortunately, its sequel, The Subtle Knife, will help put off that inevitability for a while longer. --Alix Wilber